Firearms such as handguns (e.g., pistols), including semi-automatic handguns, have been in use for centuries. The M1911 pistol, for example, originated in the late 1890s and it, in addition to several other handguns, were adopted for military service in the early 1900s. Various types of handguns, including single and double action semi-automatic pistols are used by military and law enforcement personnel, as well as by individuals, throughout the world.
Many of the components of firearms experience high impact during firing and must be constructed from materials that have high strength and corrosion-, impact- and wear-resistant properties. These components are largely constructed from metallic materials having high strength, as well as corrosion-, wear- and impact-resistance properties, such as various iron-containing metallic materials, including stainless steel materials. Other components that do not experience high impact or wear, or do not require high strength, are sometimes constructed from aluminum or polymeric materials. Some firearms have been fabricated using all stainless steel components, while others are constructed from a combination of iron-containing materials, non-iron containing materials, and polymeric materials. Firearm components are generally fabricated using various metal stamping, machining, milling, metal forming, casting, forging, and other techniques. Individual components may be welded to one another to form assemblies.
Because many firearm components are generally constructed, entirely or nearly entirely, of heavy, rigid, durable materials such as various types of stainless steel and other iron-containing materials, the overall weight of firearms is generally substantial. It is desirable, for many applications, to reduce the overall weight of firearms without reducing the strength, or the corrosion-, impact- and wear-resistance and reliability of the firearms and their components. U.S. Pat. No. 6,711,819, for example, relates to firearms having lightweight but strong components made of scandium containing aluminum alloys, which are composed of an aluminum alloy containing alloying elements including, in addition to aluminum, from about 0.05% to about 00.30% scandium with other elements such as magnesium, chromium, copper and zinc.
In other attempts to reduce weight, yet maintain the other desirable properties, firearms have been constructed using components having different metallic compositions, such as using a stainless steel slide component and an aluminum body. Other attempts to reduce the weight of firearms have involved the use of wear-resistant polymeric materials on the frame, generally in combination with an iron-containing slide component. Some components, such as triggers, have been fabricated from lighter weight alloy materials such as titanium-containing materials. While most firearm barrels are composed of iron-containing materials, at least one attempt to reduce the weight of a barrel is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,189,431, which discloses a lightweight composite gun barrel for a small caliber firearm having a substantially metallic liner and an outer layer comprising fiber reinforced resin.
The explosion bonding phenomenon was observed during World War II when the force of explosions was observed to metallurgically weld bomb fragments to impacted metal objects. DuPont developed a practical explosion bonding process for bonding different metallic materials in the early 1960s, which is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,140,539.
The art of explosion bonding materials is well known. In general, explosion bonding is a solid-state welding process that uses controlled explosive energy to force two or more metals together at high pressures. The constituent metallic layers of the resultant multi-layer composite system are joined by a high quality metallurgical bond which generally forms an abrupt transition from the one metallic layer to the other dissimilar metallic layer with virtually no degradation of the physical and mechanical properties of the constituent metallic layers. The two most common resultant bulk shapes of explosively bonded materials are rectangular sheet materials having planar bond lines and cylindrical materials having cylindrical bond lines.
A wide range of metals can be explosively bonded to one another and multiple layers of dissimilar metals bonded to one another in sequence to form multi-layer bonded metallic substrates are not uncommon. Bonded bi- or multi-metallic substrates can be machined and incorporated into a variety of products. Applications for such materials include weld transitions between dissimilar metal components, precious metal conservation, galvanic corrosion prevention, corrosion-resistant linings, bearing surfaces, and radiation shielding. These materials are used in industries as diverse as hermetic electronic packaging, marine shipbuilding, chemical processing, golf clubs, sputter targets and cooking griddles.